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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25690366">The Ink Demonth 2020</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Random_ag/pseuds/Random_ag'>Random_ag</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Bendy and the Ink Machine</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Blood, Death, F/F, F/M, Gore, Grief/Mourning, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon, Shooting, The ink demonth</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 07:01:28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>4,482</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25690366</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Random_ag/pseuds/Random_ag</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>My written prompts for this year's Ink Demonth!</p>
<p>featuring days 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 10, 16, 17, 20, 21, 23, 24, 27, 29 and 30</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>11</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Day 1: Cake</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>As the prompts delve into possibly more triggering territory please feel free to tell me if I've missed some trigger warnings!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Happy birthday, happy birthday!</p>
<p>4:15 pm, 7 years and one minute old.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The cake has only one layer - the neighbour made it; it’s made of chocolate and cream and it’s sweet enough to kill you.</p>
<p>Close your eyes and make a wish.</p>
<p>I wish Mommy and Daddy looked at me and I wish Sonja would be nicer and I wish I get pencils of many colors.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Phew! And the candles are blown out.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Silly Joey forgot you can ask a birthday cake only one wish at a time, and now none of the three he wished will come true.</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Happy birthday, happy birthday!</p>
<p>4:15 pm, 20 years and one minute old.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The cake fits in a cup, a pretty little red velvet - but there’s Henry and there’s grape juice, and this is his happiest birthday yet.</p>
<p>Close your eyes and make a wish.</p>
<p>I wish we’ll always be friends.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Phew! And the candle is blown out.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Silly Joey thought the wish had gone nowhere because there weren’t enough candles, but it’s the only one that came true.</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Happy birthday, happy birthday!</p>
<p>4:15 pm, 22 years and one minute old.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>There’s no cake this year, but its ok: there’s drinks and a lighter and laughter and we’re starting, we’re good, we’ll get big.</p>
<p>Close your eyes and make a wish.</p>
<p>I wish we get big.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Phew! And the lighter’s flame is blown out.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Silly Joey didn’t specify: so the studios got bigger and bigger, but the cartoons never made it big enough.</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Happy birthday, happy birthday!</p>
<p>8:06 pm, 1 year old exactly.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Boris and Alice hold a giant cake with fluffy frosting and puffs of cream before an ecstatic little bendy demon on a flipbook.</p>
<p>Close your eyes and make a wish.</p>
<p>I wish everything will be alright.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Flip! Bendy blows the candle out.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Silly Joey! Only the birthday boy can make a wish, don’t you know? The others won’t come true!</p>
<p>Too bad you didn’t make him on June the 22nd.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Day 2: Memory</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Ah! There it is again.</p><p>Those strange pictures flooding the mind from time to time, that strange face that feels too solid and not stretchy enough.</p><p> </p><p>It has glasses sitting on a small potato of a nose and a mouth that’s a little twisted, with small strands of what would be the beginning of a mustache on the corners of it; the eyes have a shadow underneath them and such a tired look to them under the kippah it wears. It’s a sweet, kind, tired face, and it longs to sleep a little.</p><p>It’s as pale and smooth as a porcelain doll, but the skin is coarse and the snowy hairs that make up the small beard are bristly like little pine needles. The thin eyes burn with vermilion like a cozy, timid fireplace warming up a cool room; how sweet and gentle and kind it is! And yet one would never guess, with the rough edge of its voice.</p><p>It has wavy brown hair pulled into a ponytail and something feline in its features - it might be the olive hued gaze or the sly yet friendly smile with a pair of moles decorating the left corner of it. It’s an amiable face, pretty and friendly, with a pointed chin that leans forward when mischief and love are addressed, curiously interested in the gossip.</p><p> </p><p>The Projectionist stares at the dead Striker, clutching its heart in his hand.</p><p>The Angel rests her eyes on her wolfish companion as she fixes his robotic arm.</p><p>The Piper stares in silence at the organ, expecting a friend to say hi</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Day 3: Work</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Always more.</p><p>Always more!</p><p>Always <em>more</em>!</p><p>When are we going home?</p><p>More work, more hours.</p><p>More hours, more ink.</p><p>More ink, more hard.</p><p>When are we going home?</p><p>Less money, less time.</p><p>Less time, less fun.</p><p>Less fun, less happy.</p><p>When are we going home?</p><p>Stop!</p><p>Stop it!</p><p>Stop this!</p><p>When are we going home?</p><p>When are we going home?</p><p>When are we going home?</p><p>Work hard!</p><p>Work happy!</p><p>Work more!</p><p>When are we going home?</p><p>You are never going home.</p><p>The ink drips slowly from their faces.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Day 7: Chilling</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>TRIGGER WARNING: gore, violence</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Shouldn’t perfection be lovely? Shouldn’t perfection be sweet? Shouldn’t perfection feel good and comfortable, shouldn’t it smell like lilies and roses? Shouldn’t perfection be warm, like the cute little smile on the gorgeous porcelain face looking down from the posters?</p><p> </p><p>She plunges her hands deep in the horrid entrails of the Fisher, feverishly scavenging through contorted organs as the severed head covered in barnacles gives blabbering wails in anguish and the ink squelches horrifically around slender fingers.</p><p> </p><p>Shouldn’t perfection be kind? Shouldn’t perfection be gorgeous? Shouldn’t perfection be worth it, shouldn’t it make you dance with glee? Shouldn’t perfection be warm, like a heartfelt song, like an immortal connection, like an endless burning love curling around the chest?</p><p> </p><p>She grabs the liver and lungs angrily, yanks them furiously away in desperation: ribs break with blood-curling screams as she crushes them to reach for the most important organ, the last piece to her coveted spotless beauty.</p><p> </p><p>Shouldn’t perfection be glorious? Shouldn’t perfection be incredible? Shouldn’t perfection be stupefying, shouldn’t it be awe-inspiring? Shouldn’t perfection be warm, comforting, achievable even if through desperate means, endlessly eternal in its pristine, godly magnificence?</p><p> </p><p>The heart sinks into her like an icy halberd.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Her cold freshly broken reflection shows a horribly deformed grin she knows far too well, staring back at her in another batch of countless mirror pieces lying on the floor.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Day 8: Soup</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Mourning, Implied Character Death</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Yen Ta Fo is great. It's spicy, sweet, delicious, pink - it has it all.</p><p>Ma made it whenever she could, and especially when she missed Thailand more than anything. It kind of always bothered her (and it bothered Maxie too, but not so much anymore) how the only place where she could find the red bean curbs for the sauce was in the shops of Chinatown, or how she had to make the Sriracha and fish balls on her own because neither were sold anywhere, but it's a small price to pay for a taste of home.</p><p>Susie loves it.</p><p> </p><p>She loved it.</p><p> </p><p>Maxie breathes in to get the tears back under hir eyes and for a second he doesn't even feel the hands gently getting a hold of hir shoulders.</p><p> </p><p>"Hey." hir favourite lyricist whispers, a little worry in his voice: "Is everything ok?"</p><p> </p><p>They bite hir lip, swallow nothing.</p><p> </p><p>"It just feels weird without her."</p><p> </p><p>When one sees Maxie making Yen Ta Fo, it means Susie is coming over. It means hir identical sister found the time to have her favourite soup with her twin, and that she has time to ask hir how she's doing, what script for what musical is she memorizing now, who are the other actors in the cast and who among them is insufferable, good enough or truly a joy to be around.</p><p>But Susie isn't coming over today. She isn't coming over any day of this week, month, year or life.</p><p> </p><p>All because of some cretin who got a car before learning how to drive it.</p><p> </p><p>Jack presses a kiss to the back of hir head. "I'm sorry." he mutters, "I'm really sorry."</p><p>"Don't be..."</p><p>"Can I do something for you? Anything."</p><p> </p><p>Maxie sniffs. With some difficulty, he turns to smile weakly at hir partner.</p><p> </p><p>"Wanna help me make it?"</p><p> </p><p>Jack smiles back.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>There should be a fifth portion at the table. Thomas and Allison say nothing of it, but they feel the empty plate's weight too.</p><p>At least, resting on four pairs of shoulders, it seems a little less heavy.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Maxie is genderfluid</p><p>It's only implied and maybe not very obvious, but Susie used to be in a polyromantic relationship with Allison and Thomas</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Day 10: Mechanic</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>That's no engineering marvel, she thinks.</p><p> </p><p>Look at it, at those unnerving doll-like hands that are hard and cold and nothing even vaguely similar to the squishy-looking palms of the cartoon devil, at that misshapen head. At least Bendy has something like a circle, but this... This unfortunately horrid spawn of good intentions has it stretched, and graceless, and bulky.</p><p> </p><p>It looks wrong.</p><p> </p><p>Its face is still open in half, and under the white cover its smile is too wide, way too triangular, way too uncanny, and behind the dark glass shaped like a pie-cut eye there is just a hollow shallow socket that keeps leaking oil everywhere.</p><p>The shoulders and hips are too wide - they need to be to sustain that ugly metal head, but they clash too harshly with the silhouette it is supposed to have. The spine is still too thin to properly work: calibrating it without turning it into yet another gross aggregation of metal pieces is a nightmare of its own.</p><p> </p><p>The Whipper Will'O, now <em>that</em> is a wonder. Maybe only a little weak on the joints but not enough to be a problem, especially when so close to the ground anyways; easily among some of her and Bertrum's best works.</p><p> </p><p>At least it doesn't feel like it looks at you.</p><p>Like it tilts its head to stare at you better.</p><p>Like it moves in the corner of your eye.</p><p>Like it reaches out to you, to grab you -</p><p>Before turning still again when you look at it.</p><p> </p><p>The Fisher - Barley, it should have been, it should have been Barley, but it isn't, it cannot be when within this deformed shell there is a tired, scared, hopeless mechanic together with an apathetic pirate - doesn't like to leave the flaming can. It gets too cold away from it, it risks leaving the other two alone; it is only worth it when from the speakers littered through the level a known voice gently calls for the creature to request some help.</p><p>But the flaming can is not simply warm. It stands close to a place, a room...</p><p> </p><p>The Fisher needs to guard it.</p><p>The Fisher needs to make sure it cannot crawl outside, sinking metal fingers in old wood with its big horrendous grin, coming to clutch them in its lethal grip.</p><p>The Fisher needs to keep it at bay.</p><p> </p><p>The animatronic leaks what little oil it still has, perfectly still as it lays on an abandoned work bench, unfinished, rotten, broken.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>It never moves.</em>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Day 16: Vision</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>TW: Death, Shooting</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>You must see.</p><p></p><div class="">
  <p>See it all.</p>
  <p> </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>You are the only one who can shed some light on this.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>You must see.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Watch carefully.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>There is a corpse scattered about.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>You must see.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Peek behind the corner.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>A light flickers, but has nobody to belong to.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>You must see.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>A shape runs away.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Chase it! Chase it! Chase it! Don’t let it get away, that dastardly - !</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p> </p>
  <p>SHOT.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>SHOT.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>SHOT.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p> </p>
  <p>You must see.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>That old Projectionist - he lays, in a dark pool he lays.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>They got his one good eye.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Nothing to be done, Ms. Polk. I’m sorry for your father.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Nothing to be done.</p>
</div>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Day 17: Distractions</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Endless, endless, endless dripping.</p><p> </p><p></p><div class="">
  <p>It never stops, never sates of greedily listening to the sound it makes over and over and over - drip, dripdrip drop, drop, dropdripdrip, in asynchrony, without any rhyme nor reason.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Do you know how hard it is to write music like this? With this constant uneven percussion dropping and dripping an inch away from your ear?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Do you know how restless it makes you, how it scratches your brain?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>It makes you lose focus. It makes you make mistakes that you wouldn’t make, it makes you irritable and angry and frustrated. It makes you throw away a neatly written score because right at the end you started following the damned dripping and documented it with the notes for the clarinet player.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>It makes you storm out, it makes you pick up smoking again. It makes you try to stop it only to be drenched in ink, ruining half a day of work as you wait, powerless, for someone to come and stop pumping this goddamned black sour liquid into your office.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>It makes you seek the solace of a sanctuary - and even then it follows you, with its incessant drip drip dripdripdrop drip, dropdrop, drop, drip, drop drop. It makes you cry and it makes you thirsty. It makes you blind and deaf and mute, and it makes you clutch something in your hand so hard that it shatters in your palm.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p> </p>
  <p>It makes you hear things, in the nothing.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p> </p>
  <p>It makes you go insane.</p>
</div>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Day 20: Paralyzed</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Trigger Warning for gore and violence</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>What have you witnessed?</p><p>What have you seen, my sheepish wolf?</p><p>What makes you so scared in the face of danger?</p><p> </p><p>Is it the face of your other brain’s true love, embedded in a twisted version of who they once were?</p><p>Is it the tears streaming down from your other brain’s eyes when seeing the cross eyed dead shells of long gone coworkers?</p><p>Is it the way your other brain recognizes in its hazy semi-unconscious state these corpses, these monsters that chase you down the halls, as people, as friends, as family driven from the brink into the watery abyss of madness?</p><p> </p><p>Is that the reason behind why you cannot fight them?</p><p>Behind your stubborn refusal at attacking?</p><p>Behind your terrified stillness?</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>What do your perfect eyes see, my sheep in wolf’s clothing?</p><p>What do they see?</p><p> </p><p>Do they see me?</p><p>As I once was?</p><p>Do they see my body, uncoated by a frigid capsule?</p><p>Do they see my visage, now lost forever?</p><p> </p><p>What do they see in me, to make you so afraid?</p><p>What evil do the see in me, to make you so afraid?</p><p>What corpse do they see in me, to make you so afraid?</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Please, my most perfect wolf, what do you see?</p><p> </p><p>In your paralyzed terror, what do you see?</p><p>On that operation table, trapped and shaking and unmovable, what do you see?</p><p>Before your heart is taken out and your organs rearranged, what do you see?</p><p>As you lay bleeding like this, so deadly rigid in your fear, what do you see?</p><p>As your eyes are stitched but not closed, what do you see?</p><p> </p><p>Do you see me?</p><p>Do you see the beauty you have given me?</p><p>Do you see the gorgeous angel I was always meant to be?</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Day 21: Money</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Is it enough?</p><p>Maybe, a little bit.</p><p>We can expand a little bit.</p><p>Just a little bit.</p><p> </p><p>Is it enough?</p><p>Barely.</p><p>We need to expand, still.</p><p>To get some of it back.</p><p> </p><p>Is it enough?</p><p>No. No, goddamnit.</p><p>We need to do something - anything, to get attention, to get recognition.</p><p>People need to get curious, they need to get interested.</p><p> </p><p>Is it enough?</p><p>Not anymore.</p><p>We need more.</p><p>We need so much more.</p><p> </p><p>Is it enough?</p><p>No.</p><p>No, it’s not.</p><p>Because there’s no more.</p><p> </p><p>No more money.</p><p> </p><p>No more time.</p><p> </p><p>No more.</p><p> </p><p>No more.</p><p> </p><p>Just a pen.</p><p> </p><p>Some paper.</p><p> </p><p>And the endless ticking of clockwork drenched in ink.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. Day 23: Lost</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>TW for gore (at the end)</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>"Hello?"</p><p>...ello...?</p><p></p><div class="">
  <p>...lo...?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>...o...?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>"Can someone hear me?"</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>...an someone hear m...?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>...n someone hear...?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>...omeone he...?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>...eone h....?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>...one...?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>...n...?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>The echo is swallowed in the endless black.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Do you know your name, Daniel Lewek?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Can you remember it?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Nobody is speaking.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Do you know your name, Daniel Lewek?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>He does... Not, he does not. He does. Yes, he. He does. His name is. His name is.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>His name is.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>It's Daniel.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>No. No, it's... It starts with a B.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>B, B, B.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>No. No, with a B it's... It's his nickname. His friends use it. His name is... Is it?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Is it... Does it start with? B? Or D? They sound... They sound so similar...</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He feels weak.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Was there someone in front of him just now?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>It's hard to remember.</p>
  <p> </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>His arms feel trapped. They move, but not how he wants them to. His legs are stuck in the same strange way. He needs to move, to see, to hear -</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It's all blocked.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>"Who's there?"</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>...ho's ther...?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>...o's th...?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>...s t....?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Is his body constrained now?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Do you know your name, Daniel Lewek?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Can you remember it?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>It's... It's...</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>It's...</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p> </p>
  <p>Maybe it's a good thing. That his mind was so far gone he couldn't bring it back, as his ribs were spread wide and his heart severed from his arteries.</p>
</div>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0012"><h2>12. Day 24: Heart</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Ms. Emma Lamont - how pretty she is.</p><p> </p><p>How slender and graceful, in her long large skirt, in her shirt with puffed sleeves and a collar as wide as her shoulders.</p><p>How tall, even without the small heel of her shoes, and how proud, with her chin never burrowing inside her neck.</p><p> </p><p>Ms. Abigail Lambert swallows air and turns away slightly, demurely.</p><p> </p><p>She is not supposed to look, she isn’t - Ms. Lamont is not here to be looked at by her: she’s here for the animators to copy her precise movements along with Mr. Grosso’s.</p><p> </p><p>Ms. Lambert does not like dancing much, but never before did she wish so badly this wasn’t the case; never before did she wish so badly to have light feet to pirouette in front of the camera used for rotoscoping with Ms. Lamont.</p><p>How much she would like to dance with her.</p><p> </p><p>Is this a good occasion?</p><p> </p><p>Ms. Lambert extends her hand to Ms. Lamont timidly; it’s a request to be led, not to lead, because she doesn’t know how. It is accepted. Their fingers intertwine, melt together, a palm on a shoulder and another pressing lightly on the waist, and they move; they dance, clumsily and slowly, but they dance for a little while, and it is gorgeous and bashful and sweet. It’s a little hard - a little painful - but they move their arms not to waltz anymore, to gently embrace instead. Arms around the neck, arms resting on hips. Emma presses her forehead to Abigail’s, and they dance, slowly, slowly, slowly, gazing into liquid eyes.</p><p> </p><p>There should be lips to kiss, there should be moths flying around a flame in the stomach, there should be hearts beating so fast and loud all other sounds are drowned out.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>But Lost Ones have nothing aside from memories and a cold melting prison.</p>
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<a name="section0013"><h2>13. Day 27: Fight</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up</em>
</p><p> </p><p>Bertrum Piedmont opens his eyes to nothingness. The void. Black. His neck feels constricted, his head is throbbing, something is drooling off of his nape and lip and his ears are ringing.</p><p> </p><p><em>there’s something wrong there’s something wrong there’s something wrong there’s something wrong</em> <em>there’s something wrong there’s something wrong there’s something wrong</em> <em>there’s something wrong there’s something wrong there’s something wrong</em></p><p> </p><p>His entire body doesn’t seem paralyzed, but doesn’t feel right either way. He struggles to raise his hand: it’s hard to maneuver and gives freightening cracks when bending the wrist.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs arms no legs</em>
</p><p> </p><p>He passes on to move the other hand. And the other. And the other. There should not be these many hands. Where are they attached to anyways? He bends his elbows. All four at once.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>crack creek creak crack creek creak crack creek creak crack creek creak crack creek creak crack creek creak crack creek creak crack creek creak crack creek creak crack creek creak crack creek creak crack creek creak crack creek creak crack creek creak</em>
</p><p> </p><p>He slams his arms on the ground. It shakes harshly; he is not hurt. He is cold, he feels; cold, undented, immaculate, creaking. Needs oil. Oil? For a human being? He shakes, and his arms spin.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal it’s not normal</em>
</p><p> </p><p>He raises his arms, pounds them on the ground, throws them around himself. His whole torso twists, leaving his head and neck in place. He riots against his unmoving, spinning body.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out want out</em>
</p><p> </p><p>The void opens wide to blinding lights. The arm of an octopus ride shields his eyes. Bertrum Piedmont stares at it for a moment, at how the cart swings lazily. Ink drips from his lip.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>
  <em>this can’t be it</em>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Bertrum Piedmont rages for days, fighting yet another war with his body.</p><p>This time, he does not win.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0014"><h2>14. Day 29: Despair</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Curiosity killed the cat, the saying goes, don’t it?</p><p> </p><p>Well, it sure killed <em>him</em>.</p><p> </p><p>Henry lets himself slump against the closed door. The seeing tool falls out of his hands as he slides down to the ground.</p><p>It’s worthless now anyways; the signs have already gotten stitched into his retinas.</p><p> </p><p>Tallies.</p><p>Walls of tallies.</p><p>How many there are exactly he doesn’t know - doesn’t <em>want</em> to know.</p><p> </p><p>Is that how long he’s been there?</p><p> </p><p>Is that how long he’s been going through this hellish charade?</p><p> </p><p>Is that how many times he has come back to this spot, been struck by a cultist, bossed around by an angel, lost his only friend?</p><p> </p><p>The door behind him is locked. There is no use in crying out on it and pointing to it over and over. He wants to leave, <em>god</em> how he wants to, but that is just the first of a long line of choices that are taken from him.</p><p> </p><p>He stares ahead, motionless, a corpse left to rot in the back of a building.</p><p> </p><p>A little thought, like a little card, slips into his brain: find the ink machine.</p><p>He does not move.</p><p> </p><p>He will - because he <em>will. </em>Eternity is quite boring on its own. No need to make it worse.</p><p>But for now he just wants to stare.</p><p>Stare into nothingness.</p><p>For a while.</p><p>A long, long while.</p><p> </p><p>Forever would be good.</p><p> </p><p>His eyes feel tired yet they cannot close.</p><p>It’s fine.</p><p>He’s used to this.</p><p> </p><p>There are tears staining his cheeks.</p><p>He can’t feel anything.</p><p>Anything.</p><p> </p><p>He will move - because he <em>has</em> to.</p><p> </p><p>But now, his limbs are too weak.</p><p>His mind is too broken.</p><p> </p><p>Henry stares into the Studio, unfolding before him like the insides of a gargantuan snake that has just trapped him within his jaws, crying without any feeling left in the husk of who he once was.</p><p> </p><p>He stares, cries, sits.</p><p> </p><p>He will move.</p><p>He has to.</p><p> </p><p>His eyes are wide open in the endless slumber of his brain, his soul, his will.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0015"><h2>15. Day 30: Hope</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Shawn's spouse and children belong to Control_Room, or insane-control-room on tumblr</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p></p><div class="">
  <p>Did you hear?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Jolene Polk, she works for old Piedmont's company. She's bright and a stellar electrician, just like her dad - can work with everything and anything, yes sir! She misses her old man, and old mr. Cohen too, who stayed close to her in his last years like a second father, but she's happy. She's doing fine she is, she's doing swell.</p>
  <p> </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Did you hear?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Jack Fain has a lover, they say, a sweetheart diva. He and that Johnny organist (you remember him, that flirt!) partnered up, they make all sorts of jingles now - for radio, TV, cinema, you name it! And a little bird told me they might be working in the musical scene too. They're doing swell they are, they're doing fine.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Did you hear?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Old Abby moved to England some years ago, after that Lamont gal came to the States again for a quick vacation; seems like they're sharing a house there. I heard through the grape vine that they're doing gorgeously together - that the neighbours say they're the image of love. They're doing fine they are, they're doing swell.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Did you hear?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Poor Benton lost her fight, they say - well, I say the ulcer got her in her sleep because otherwise she would have punched it dead!... I'm glad she can have some tranquillity now. She's doing swell she is, she's doing fine.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Did you hear?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>That Dot girl, she's got her own place now! Her own company! She and her friend, the Lewek kid, found each other again and founded the Cowardly Lion Studios. Next month it'll be five succesful years already, and by the looks of it they have another ten more to come. They're doing fine they are, they're doing swell.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Did you hear?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Lawrence moved to Florida - yes, Samuel Lawrence! With crocodiles in his backyard! They say he found an old flame down there and now they live by the sea, with their three kids and one dog (wait, isn't that how Franks is doing? I swear, I heard the same exact thing about him...). He's doing swell he is, he's doing fine.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Did you hear?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Shawn Flynn's got a baby boy now! His two girls were really happy when they heard they were getting a brother - er, adopted cousin brother... See, it's a complicated story. His spouse got around to buying that house on the hill too, with that big lavander field all around them. They're doing fine they are, they're doing swell.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Did you hear?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Allison's second child was born a couple months ago, I think. She and Thomas say she looks a lot like her second mother. They say the delivery was good - she's doing swell she is, she's doing fine.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Did you hear?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Kim got married! No Bones Grosso got married! To Niamh O'Flannel no less! I told you they'd get together, didn't I! (You owe me 20 bucks.) They work with Flynn now, I think - she does the accounting, they do the sewing. They're alright, despite still not being over... You know. But they're doing fine they are, they're doing swell.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Did you hear?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Henry and Linda've got a daughter! About time, right? They say her name's Audrey, a lovely girl of sixteen - oh, well, they adopted her of course, they didn't just hide her away all this time. They love her so much, they say, and she's so happy to be with them. I'm just glad for them, you know? They're doing swell they are, they're doing fine.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Did you hear?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Heard through the grape vine that Drew's got himself... A little crush... You know that lawyer back in the Studios...? Mr. McNamara, the one who married and divorced Drew's half-sister...? Seems like he figured out a couple things, if you catch my drift, and well... Well, I hear they're doing fine they are, they're doing swell.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>Did you hear?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>I saw Thaische O'Flannel sit by the factotum's tomb with Charlie McNamara.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>I think they were holding hands.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>They're doing swell they are.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> </p>
  <p>They're doing fine.</p>
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